


Just before Dawn

by literature_and_ocean_waves



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies), X-Men (Movieverse), X-Men (Original Timeline Movies), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: 'Everything is the same but both Charles and Erik are women' AU, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, But whatever, Gender or Sex Swap, I hate the term genderbend, been feeling kinda maternal lately which is why so many of my recent stories have been about babies, both of the maximoff twins are girls, bottom line erik is a woman, childbirth so be warned, since what we really mean is sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-03
Updated: 2017-05-03
Packaged: 2018-10-27 15:33:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10811859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/literature_and_ocean_waves/pseuds/literature_and_ocean_waves
Summary: "The room smelled like sweat and blood. But mostly blood.A soft sighing to Erik’s right told her it was time to move.She got slowly to her feet, the lower half of her throbbing in agony. She just shut it out; there had been far worse pains before. "





	Just before Dawn

Erik lay on her naked back against the cold, hard, wooden floor. 

She stared up at the paint chipped and water-stained ceiling, watching dust particles dance and swish overhead. Her chest rose and fell with each shallow, exhausted breath. 

The room smelled like sweat and blood. But mostly blood. 

A soft sighing to Erik’s right told her it was time to move. 

She got slowly to her feet, the lower half of her body throbbing in agony. She just shut it out; there had been far worse pains before. 

She grabbed a wet washcloth from the room’s ensuite bath and wiped off the excess blood from her thighs. She could shower off later when this was all over. 

She cleaned the washcloth with warm water and walked over to the bed. 

The babies were still lying on the little gray towel, wiggling and whimpering at the chilly air. 

Erik leaned down and cleaned them of the blood and goop. Mercifully, they did not cry at all the fuss, not even at the rough, worn-down edges of the old washcloth. 

Erik tried not to look at the babies as she cleaned them. It offered far too much temptation to want to pick them up and hold them close. 

But she did unwillingly pick up on a few things. Like how the first baby’s skin was a soft brown and the fuzz covering her head was a rich mahogany. Perhaps it would stay that way as she grew into a woman. 

The second baby was just the opposite. Skin white as spilled milk and tuffs of alabaster hair. She squirmed a lot more than her sister at the cleaning.

When both babies were all clean and dry, Erik wrapped them in warm, snug blankets and placed them in the wicker basket that she had bought so many weeks ago. Feeling safe and cozy once more, the babies fell fast asleep. 

Erik hastily grabbed some paper and a pen and wrote out everything that she could, before sealing it into an envelope. She put the envelope, and a prepackaged wad of money, into the basket. 

Then, still completely nude, she opened the window and quite literally stepped out into the spring night. 

 

She flew through the air, hovering a few dozen feet over the Czechoslovakian cityscape. No one was out and all the buildings were dark. That was good. She had saved herself some precious time by not bothering with clothes; the evening was warm anyway. 

After a few minutes of silent flight, she spotted her target. At the outskirts of the city, a Romani caravan was nestled against the edge of a forest. The encampment had been there for a while now and Erik sent a silent thanks to the new Soviet laws demanding that the Roma stay in place. 

Erik landed on the doorstep of one of the vardo, silent as a ghost. She gently placed the basket on the tiny porch. The babies were still deeply asleep, rocked by the gentle path of her flight. 

She flew up into one of the trees, landing on a large branch. She was invisible in the inkiness of the night, but years of training let her still see the caravan. 

Erik stretched out with her powers, grabbing hold of the big, brass door knocker, and knocked heavily. After a moment or two, a young man came to the door, holding an oil lamp. His thick, black hair was disheveled and his long, green nightshirt was rumpled from sleep. He rubbed at tired eyes, searching for the source of the knocking. 

“Hello?” Django Maximoff called out. “Anyone there?”

Erik stayed quiet, just watching. Django looked unchanged since the last time she had seen him, nearly a year ago. Strong, broad shoulders, dark brown skin, and a kind, open face. 

Django looked down and started in surprise when he saw the basket. “What in the world…” he murmured. 

He picked up the envelope and opened it, his mouth moving silently along with the words as he read the letter. Erik, though she already knew what the letter detailed, read his lips from her spot on the tree. 

 

“Dear Django, 

I had hoped that our last meeting could have been our final interaction and you would be free of me forever.  
But apparently fate had other ideas. 

These two babies are your daughters. They were born less than an hour ago and the darker one is a few minutes older. 

I am sure you have already figured out what I have been doing for all these years and are smart enough to know that that path is no place for two defenseless babies.  
I wish it did not have to be this way, but like most things in my life, it just is and I have to live with it. 

I know that you will love these children and take good care of them.  
I have enclosed some money for the three of you. Use it to keep yourselves safe. 

Perhaps someday I will be able to see you all again, once the evil that murdered our families has been destroyed. But until that time I must continue on my mission. 

If the children ask about me when they are older, tell them whatever you feel is best. 

Good bye, my friend. Be safe. 

-Erika”

 

Django finished reading and stood on the porch for a long time, staring at the letter. He picked up the money and counted it quickly, inhaling sharply at the huge amount. 

Erik continued to watch him, waiting. 

Finally, he leaned down to the basket, looking at the two sleeping newborns. He ran his thumb very lightly over their little faces and smiled, soft and loving. Erik exhaled a tiny sigh of relief. 

“I guess she gave me one last gift, huh, little ones?” Django whispered. He put the money and letter into a small, leather pouch on a cord around his neck. Then he scooped up the basket, cooing at the babies. “Well come on in.”

He walked back inside the vardo and shut the door, his lamp illuminating the tiny space as he set to getting the children comfortable. 

Erik took that as her cue and floated up from her tree branch and into the sky. 

 

She flew back to the gritty, little hotel and climbed in through the still open window. The room still stank of blood, so she set to work clearing away the evidence of this night. Thankfully, most of it had gotten on the towels she had laid out for herself. She dumped them down the rusty, old laundry shoot. 

Her knife was still caked with dried blood from where she had severed the cords between her body and her babies. She washed it off in the dingy, bathroom sink and packed it away in her suitcase. 

She turned on the shower and bathed, washing off the many hours’ worth of sweat. The water was not warm, but Erik did not care. It actually helped her focus, rattling her tired brain back into action. She scrubbed shampoo into her short, thick, blonde hair, feeling more human than she had in a very long time. 

When she was all clean, she dried off with the room’s last few towels and took a long look at herself in the mirror. 

Her usually lean hips were more rounded and her belly was soft and squishy. They gave her long, androgynous frame an unwanted femininity that would make blending in a bit harder. But both her hips and stomach would be gone in a few weeks on the run again anyway and at least her belly was not ballooned out any more. That had been impossible to hide. 

She stowed the tent-like dresses she had been wearing these past few months into her suitcase and retrieved a pair of men’s slacks and shirt, setting them on the bed. 

She grabbed the familiar strips of stretchy, durable cloth from the bottom of the case and tied them tightly around her chest, wincing at the tender flesh. Her normally athletic breasts were larger than before, swollen with milk. She would have to fix that to avoid infection and to get them back to their hide-able size. 

The binding cloths did their job and while her chest stuck out a bit more than it had a year ago, it was still not noticeable; especially not under the loose fit of her shirt. 

She smoothed back her hair into a masculine style and donned her trilby and overcoat, checking herself in the mirror. A young man stared back at her. He was less coifed than she would have liked; his face fuller and his clothes wrinkled and a bit frumpy-looking. But he was passable. That was all that mattered. 

Erik packed up the remainder of her belongings into her suitcase and stepped onto windowsill, looking back at the room. Nothing left to see, she leaped out into the predawn. 

 

Around mid-morning, the owner of the crummy Czechoslovakian hotel knocked on the door of room 37A. When no one answered, she slowly slid it open. She found the space to be spotless and empty, save for the tiniest whiff of copper in the air. A small stack of money sat on the dresser, payment and more for the former occupant’s several months of stay.  
The owner pocketed the money and went on about her day. She had better things to worry about than a tenant who disappeared in the middle of the night. 

A few dozen miles away, a train was whooshing down a clacking track, out of the Soviet Union and headed for Spain. In one of the sleeper cars, a young man climbed into the top, rickety bunkbed. He collapsed onto the mattress and curled up into the wall, clutching his suitcase to his chest like a child with a stuffed animal. His hat covered his face and his coat was draped over him like blanket. 

Finally, finally, Erik closed her eyes and fell into dreamless, exhausted sleep. 

 

The End.


End file.
